, Jan. 15 -- For centuries, traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) was practiced with ritual and patience: dried roots and peels were weighed from wooden drawers, brought home and slowly boiled into a bitter brew whenever the body required healing.

Today, it can be ordered iced and sipped on the commute.

On Chengdu's bustling Chunxi Road, a long established commercial district in southwest China's Sichuan Province, an unexpected cup of coffee is reshaping perceptions. "It tastes like regular coffee at first," said Shazia, a Pakistani student in China. "But there's a light, lemony note at the end."

The drink, a dried tangerine peel and hawthorn Americano, comes from Tong Ren Tang, a renowned traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) pharmacy with ...